Letter: IRS scandal

Saturday

Jul 6, 2013 at 12:01 AMJul 6, 2013 at 6:49 PM

I read your editorial of 29 June about the IRS scandal with great interest but take issue with your priorities in treating the profligate spending as more important than the harassment of Conservative groups seeking 501(c) status. The spending scandal, while significant for its demonstration of arrogance and bad management at IRS, amounts to but a rounding error in the gargantuan federal budget and probably could be matched by similar stupidity in many other Federal agencies.

Jim Senner, New Bern

I read your editorial of 29 June about the IRS scandal with great interest but take issue with your priorities in treating the profligate spending as more important than the harassment of Conservative groups seeking 501(c) status. The spending scandal, while significant for its demonstration of arrogance and bad management at IRS, amounts to but a rounding error in the gargantuan federal budget and probably could be matched by similar stupidity in many other Federal agencies. However, the systematic effort to deny First Amendment rights to political opponents of the Obama regime is far more sinister and far reaching, presenting a greater threat to our liberty than anything since the Nixon years. Somewhere around the 2010 victories for Tea Party candidates in Congressional elections someone appears to have decided that the Tea Party presented a danger to the President's re-election and the prospects of his party and took steps to marginalize them for the 2012 elections. Over a period of about 2 years, through a series of obviously inappropriate questions and delaying tactics, about 200 Conservative organizations were unable to obtain tax exempt status. This crippled their fundraising and organizational efforts at a time when they needed most to be active. While I won't pretend to know how much effect this had on the 2012 elections, it should be obvious that it had some effect. Obama is too smart to have left a trail leading to the White House but the entire operation has all the hallmarks of Chicago thuggery on it. All he needed to have done, like Henry II, is to have uttered some version of "will no one rid me of this turbulent (Tea Party)" and that would be sufficient for his minions at the IRS to spring into action. The fact that several Progressive organizations were earmarked for "special attention" is in no way exculpatory as the special attention seems to have been to give them priority approval. It is noteworthy that NONE of the Progressive organizations were significantly delayed in getting 501(c) status whereas Tea Party related organizations waited two years or longer and some still have not had their cases resolved. Congress has now gotten its teeth into the matter and, despite efforts by administration apologists like Elijah Cummings, we are finally beginning to see some real efforts to get to the bottom of the matter. I look forward to the upcoming hearings and hope that other Sun Journal readers will be following them closely.

Jim Senner, New Bern

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